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Award-winning novelist Caryl Phillips last week flew from New York to Leeds just to witness a testimonial for Lucas Radebe. Here he salutes the South African who set the standard on and off the pitch for African footballers in England

The following correction was printed in the Observer's For the record column, Sunday May 15 2005

"In the article below, we quote from a report by the Sir Norman Chester Centre for Football Research at Leicester University, stating that in 1988, winger Mark Walters was subject to racist taunting from his own club's fans after joining Rangers. We should clarify that only one Rangers fan was ever officially found to be involved in racist chanting against Walters and was subsequently banned from Ibrox stadium for life. On 2 January 1988 at Celtic Park, Walters was subjected to racial abuse and chanting and again a week later at Tynecastle during a Hearts v Rangers fixture. On both occasions, the abuse came from Celtic and Hearts supporters respectively."

The quietest, but perhaps the most profound, change in English football in the past decade has been the thorough integration of African footballers into the upper echelons of the game. Jay-Jay Okocha, Celestine Babayaro, Nwankwo Kanu, Quinton Fortune, Fredi Kanouté, Lomana Tresor Lualua, Yakubu Aiyegbeni, Kolo Touré and many others have established themselves at the highest level, but at the head of this recent tradition of African footballing excellence in England stands Lucas Radebe. He arrived at Elland Road in 1994 in a deal that brought both him and the highly fancied Phil Masinga from South Africa to join Howard Wilkinson's Leeds United. Eleven years later, Radebe has now played his final game in England.

There were African footballers in the British game before Radebe. Leeds's own Albert Johanneson arrived in 1961 from Johannesburg and played 200 games for the club before moving to York City in 1970. In 1965 he was the first African to play in the FA Cup final . His performance on the day was, however, characterised by an all-too-familiar occurrence of stage fright. It was George Best who noted that 'Albert was quite a brave man to actually go on the pitch in the first place, wasn't he?' The racism of the period was endemic. Johanneson did not help matters with his unfortunate habit of calling his teammates 'sir '. After his retirement from football, he disappeared into obscurity; in 1995 he died alone in a Leeds high-rise flat, the victim of depression and alcoholism.

The same natural reticence did not mark the personality of Ghana striker Tony Yeboah. He arrived at Leeds at about the same time as Radebe, with a reputation as the tough, free-scoring centre-forward of Eintracht Frankfurt. When Wilkinson was asked by the press if he was 'any good ', meaning was he another of these Africans whose natural ebullience might not survive a harsh English winter, Wilkinson replied with one of his better ripostes, pointing out that Eintracht Frankfurt had not made him captain because he was black. He won goal of the season with an astonishing volley against Liverpool on his debut and averaged a goal every other game. In the end, Yeboah stayed for two years at Leeds. He eventually left after a bitter falling out with the new manager, George Graham.

The late Eighties and early Nineties are remembered for the rise of black British footballers. This, after all, was the era that saw Ugo Ehiogu captain the England under-21 side against Holland in 1993. In the same year, Paul Ince became the first black footballer to captain the full England side when he led the team out against the United States. However, the rise of Lucas Radebe was about to refocus the media's attention on African players.

Born in Soweto, South Africa, in 1969, Radebe grew up in a small house as one of 11 brothers and sisters. His early years coincided with the most difficult period of the anti-apartheid struggle and he was frequently a witness to the escalating violence perpetrated by both local gangs and white South Africa's security forces. Radebe, who carried a knife and was street-smart, just about managed to stay on the right side of the law; although he was active in the student movement, which hijacked government vehicles and dispensed vigilante justice when necessary, Radebe himself never physically harmed anybody.

When Radebe was 15, his increasingly anxious parents sent him away to school in one of the so-called independent homelands, Bophuthatswana, in the north-west of the country. There he began to train as a teacher, but he was bored by his studies and by the strange rural surroundings. To pass the time in this 'Bantustan', as apartheid's 'black homelands' such as Bophuthatswana and Ciskei were known, he began to play football, initially preferring to play in goal, but soon switching to the outfield where he was a holding midfielder.

His skills brought him to the attention of the famous Johannesburg club Kaizer Chiefs and their scout Patrick 'Ace' Ntsoelengoe. He persuaded Radebe to move back to Johannesburg and sign professional forms. Soon after, in 1991, an incident occurred that made the young footballer realise just how precarious his situation was in South Africa. While on his way with one of his brothers to do some shopping for his mother, he heard gunfire. Used to the sound of shots, he and his brother looked around to see just who had been shot. It was then that Radebe felt the pain in his back and noticed that he was covered in blood.

Once Radebe reached hospital, the doctors determined that no vital organs had been hit, although he had lost a considerable amount of blood. The bullet had entered his back and passed out through his thigh, but he was reassured that he would be able to play football again. Although nobody was ever arrested and charged with his shooting, Radebe initially suspected that somebody had been hired to shoot him. There had, after all, been talk of his leaving Kaizer Chiefs for another club, and such 'punishments' were not uncommon in the prevailing climate of the country. When, three years later, Leeds came knocking on his door, Radebe was ready to start life anew elsewhere.

His first two seasons at Leeds were not promising, with Radebe making only a handful of appearances. To make matters worse, his friend and compatriot Phil Masinga was also finding it difficult to establish himself in the first team, even though he was supposed to be the 'key' acquisition of the pair. After two years, Masinga was sold to St Gallen in Switzerland.

Radebe's perseverance was repaid with the arrival as manager of George Graham in September 1996. Graham saw what Wilkinson had failed to see and his very first action as manager was to lobby the board to sign this 'fringe' player to a long-term contract. Finally, clear of niggling injuries and a doubting manager, Radebe quickly became a rock at the heart of the Leeds defence. In 1998 'the chief' was appointed club captain. Other English clubs noticed and in the late Nineties a steady flow of African players began to filter into the mainstream of English football.

Radebe's development as a South Africa international coincided with the emergence of his country from the apartheid era. He made his debut for Bafana Bafana, as South Africa are known, in 1991; in 1996 he was part of the team who, on home soil, defeated Tunisia 2-0 to win the African Cup of Nations. By the time France 98 came around, Radebe - by now a friend of Nelson Mandela, who called him 'Big Tree' - was captaining South Africa to a respectable campaign in their first appearance in the World Cup finals. Their only defeat was to the hosts, the eventual winners.

In September 1998, Graham left Leeds for Tottenham Hotspur and Radebe was devastated. His game had blossomed under the tutelage of the defensive-minded Scotsman and Radebe considered moving clubs with him. However, the new manager, David O'Leary, like his predecessor, made it clear to the Leeds board that the first, and most important, priority was the resigning of Radebe to a contract that would effectively keep him at Leeds for the rest of his career. It wasn't just Radebe's performances on the field that earned the respect of O'Leary and others, but his extraordinary dedication to anti-racism work, and his commitment to the evolution of football in his home country was attracting wide attention. In 2000, Fifa, the game's world governing body, honoured him with their fair-play award and the citation made special mention of his work with children in Soweto and all over South Africa.

The most serious attempt to lure Radebe away from Elland Road was in 2000, when Leeds turned down an offer of £6 million from Roma. Thereafter, nearly two years of recurring knee and ankle injuries led to his retirement from international football as the most capped South Africa player of all time, but these problems also severely restricted his playing time at Leeds.

In 2002 I interviewed a recuperating Radebe in a cramped office at Elland Road. As we talked about his South African childhood, about Leeds and racism, we were continually interrupted by everybody from coach Brian Kidd to Rio Ferdinand. They were surprised to see him at the training ground and clearly full of respect for the quiet dignity of the man. It was easy to see how this tall, imposing man had earned his nickname from Mandela, but the reflective thoughtfulness of his conversation lent him the air of a politician or diplomat as opposed to that of a footballer.

Now the playing days of South Africa's first footballing superstar are over. Last week a remarkable array of players assembled at Elland Road to participate in a testimonial that saw a Leeds Legends XI pitted against a World Football XI under the judicious eye of Sam Allardyce.

I was there, too. I am a life-long Leeds fan, but I would not have flown in from New York City, where I now live, to pay tribute to any post-Revie player other than 'the chief '. I attended my first Leeds game as a five-year-old back in 1963 . I revelled in the triumphs of the Sixties and Seventies while learning how to endure the racism and hostility of the period. But, in the end, the verbal and, at times, physical abuse eventually proved too much and I spent 10 years boycotting Elland Road. The sad fact was that, for the longest while, it appeared that neither Leeds nor the city council wished to do anything about this serious problem.

The arrival of Radebe at Elland Road finally brought to the club a man who combined world-class footballing excellence with the dignity and authority to combat racism, both for Leeds and for South Africa. In these difficult, transitional times for the game, I salute him as representing everything that is good about football. Radebe is donating the £500,000 that his testimonial game earned to charity, a gesture which is thoroughly in character. I wish there were some way to keep him at Leeds for ever, but as South Africa prepares to host the 2010 World Cup we will, fortunately, be hearing much more about 'the chief' in the immediate years ahead.

· Caryl Phillips is the author of A Distant Shore, which won the 2004 Commonwealth Writers Prize. His latest novel, Dancing in the Dark, will be published in September.

Landmark moments

1881 Andrew Watson, born in British Guiana becomes the first black player to play international football, for Scotland against England. He wins three caps.

1889 Arthur Wharton becomes England's first black professional player when he signs for Preston North End.

1908 Walter Tull plays the first of two seasons at Tottenham, before four more at Northampton. After becoming the first black officer in the British army he is killed in 1918 on the Somme.

1965 South African Albert Johanneson becomes the first black player to appear in an FA Cup final. He starts for Leeds as they lose 2-1 to Liverpool at Wembley.

1977 Laurie Cunningham becomes the first black player to represent England, for the under-21s against Scotland.

1978 Viv Anderson is the first black player to represent England at full international level, winning the first of his 30 caps against Czechoslovakia.

1982 Cyrille Regis comes on as substitute in England's 4-0 win against Northern Ireland. Before the game he receives a letter containing a bullet and a message: 'If you play for England at Wembley, one of these will be shot into your knees, you black bastard.'

1984 John Barnes's wonder goal for England against Brazil in Rio De Janeiro is overshadowed by the presence on the trip of National Front activists. Barnes recalls: ' From checking in my bags at Heathrow until the end of the trip 10 days later, there were three NF members never more than a couple of paces behind myself and [fellow black player] Mark Chamberlain. On the way back, I heard them telling people the result was Brazil 0 England 1. Scorer Mark Hateley.'

1988 English winger Mark Walters is subject to racist taunting from his own club's fans after joining Rangers.

1993 Paul Ince becomes the first black player to captain England, in a 2-0 defeat against the United States.

1994 South Africans Lucas Radebe and Phil Masinga join Leeds, heralding the emergence of a new multinational and cosmopolitan game in England. Within a few years Patrick Vieira, Thierry Henry and Marcel Desailly of France's World Cup-winning side are all playing in England.

2004 Ron Atkinson is forced to resign as an ITV pundit when he makes racist remarks about Chelsea's Desaillyafter a Champions League defeat to Monaco.

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About this article

Football and race: Caryl Phillips on Lucas Radebe

This article appeared in Observer Sport Monthly
on Saturday 7 May 2005.
It was published on
the Guardian website
at 10.54 EDT on Sunday 8 May 2005.
It was last modified at 10.54 EDT on Monday 16 May 2005.
It was first published at 10.54 EDT on Monday 16 May 2005.